Civilization and its Discontents? Part Deux

A few days ago, a Kenyan friend of mine commented on the supposed depravity of Western civilization in a Facebook post. According to his sources, in 1938, the Nobel Peace Prize committee found itself deadlocked over whether it should grant the prize to Gandhi or Hitler. As it turns out, this story is actually a fiction concocted by Tariq Ali - the Pakistani-British Leftist "intellectual" (See HERE).

Meanwhile, back in the real world (see HERE):

Archbishop Desmond Tutu touched another tripwire this week by nominating mass-murderer Marwan Barghouti for the Nobel Peace Prize, an act hailed by the Arab press. “Barghouti is currently serving five life sentences in an Israeli prison for his role in leading terrorist activities during the first and second intifadas that included dozens of suicide bombings against Israeli civilians. He is a former leader of the Tanzim, a militant faction of the Fatah party currently headed by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, that took credit for many of the murders during the bloody Second Initfada in the early 2000’s. In 2014, he called for the launch of a third intifada,” the Jewish Press reported.

What does this say about African civilization, that a priest will nominate someone who is serving five concurrent life prison sentences after having been found guilty in a court of law for murdering innocent people? Perhaps it says that so long as the person in question is killing (supposedly) "white" people or "colonialists" (i.e. the biggest lie of all), this is actually praiseworthy?  

It is said that even though very few Southern whites were slave owners, they were willing to fight and die for the cause of slavery just so that there would be someone they felt was beneath them. Similarly, it seems extremely fortunate for Africans and aging Leftist "Liberation" theologians of Tutu's ilk that the Jews exist.

We are literally the gift that keeps on giving.  Since Jews supposedly committed deicide and accepted that "His blood shall be on us and on our children!" (Mathew 27:25) we are uniquely evil. Opposing Israel and being anti-Zionist is not just politically correct, it is a church-sanctioned prerogative.

Or as the old saying goes: "The more things change the more they stay the same."

I'm Finally Feeling the Bern

From CNN: Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders, D-Vt., tweeted: “It’s horrific. It’s unthinkable.”

I am trying to understand - What exactly is unthinkable? That a Muslim terrorist chose to murder innocent civilians? Or that someone who was raised to believe that gay people are an abomination that deserve to die actually acted on his theologically sound (from his perspective) beliefs.

It is precisely because well-meaning but clueless idiots such as Bernie cannot fathom the danger of this barbarism that the Left is on the wrong side of history and will lead us to the abyss. Societies don't just disappear. First they crumble from within.

If this entirely predictable scenario comes off as "unthinkable" to you, then you definitely do not have what it takes to protect the American people in what is, unfortunately, a civilizational struggle.

Brace Yourselves!!!

You are about to be reminded by President Obama that Islam is a Religion of Peace.

By the end of the day his spin doctors will try to turn this into just another abject lesson on the "scourge of gun violence" and the need to curtail 2nd Amendment rights.

Anyone who will dare to say anything else is a racist and an Islamophobe.

Please note that this fact is not up for discussion.

My 2 cents: A society that cannot appreciate its contributions nor identify the threats that it faces is doomed to disappear. A phobia is an irrational fear. I have nothing against Muslims per se, but Islamism i.e. political Islam is a dangerous death cult and a tangible threat to humanity. There is nothing irrational about this fear. Complacency is irrational and primarily harms those Muslims that liberals and progressives think they are protecting.

UPDATE 1: That didn't take long:

"Obama also noted that the worst mass shooting in U.S. history is a further reminder of how easy it is for someone to get a weapon that allows them to shoot people in a school, in a house of worship, a movie theater or a gay nightclub."

UPDATE 2: From President Obama's statement:

"We are still learning all the facts. This is an open investigation. We’ve reached no definitive judgment on the precise motivations of the killer. The FBI is appropriately investigating this as an act of terrorism. And I’ve directed that we must spare no effort to determine what -- if any -- inspiration or association this killer may have had with terrorist groups. What is clear is that he was a person filled with hatred."

This is clearly an out and out lie. Mateen declared his allegiance to the Islamic State while on the phone with 911. There is no way that Obama did not know this. Hence his willingness to classify this as a terrorist act. Clearly, he did not say this because he does not want to single out a certain religious group that is implicated in this attack.

The last statement is completely delusional. "What is clear is that he was a person filled with hatred." Really? That's it? Just a bad seed, a misanthrope and sociopath who was off his meds tonight? Perhaps the shooter was ideologically motivated? Perhaps Omar honestly and truly believed that what they were doing was Allah's will and hence an act of Love based on their understanding of what God really wants? I am certainly not justifying this barbarism, but it is consistent with a certain weltanshchauung.

Yehi Zikhram Barukh - Blessed be their Memory

I have been closely following all of the tragic events in Mumbai and my heart really goes out to everyone who has suffered because of these terrifying and senseless acts.

I did not personally know Rabbi Holtzberg, but I corresponded with him on several occasions when I lived in India. He was gracious and kind and made sure that I was supplied with Matzohs and seders for the two Passovers I spent in Puri. He even extended a personal invitation for me and my family to come spend the holiday with him in Nariman House. We never did make it and now I truly regret not having had the honor to have personally met him and his selfless wife Rivka in person.

As a father to two young boys, I can also not help but feel anguish at the though of their son Moshe, who was orphaned a day shy of his second birthday, which is today. If any of you wish to help Moshe, it is possible to make a contribution by clicking on this link: Chabad India

Mi SheNikhnas ...

Just last week I was telling a friend how one of the happiest moments in my life was a Purim celebrated over 20 years ago in the company of hundreds of drunk revelers singing at the top of their lungs and dancing round and round in a large circle. That night, for the first time, I experienced an absolute joyous and expansive ecstasy - a type of out of body experience that you usually need to take drugs to induce. Yet, ironically, it was not that I felt limitless and part of infinity, but rather I lost all sense of my own body and felt as if my consciousness was one with the swirling mass.

That swirling mass is Am Yisrael and that place was Merkaz HaRav.

Dubious Distinction

According to Phillip Jacobson, who recently spent three days in Sderot and reports on the harrowing experience for the Daily Mail:

Sderot has a unique civic claim: on a rocket-per-head-of-population basis, it is the most targeted town in Israel, indeed the world.

It is more than six years since the first rocket was launched from Gaza.

Since then, well over 2,000 Qassams – named after a fiery Muslim preacher – have landed in or around the town killing 13 people (including four children) and injuring several dozen more. Since the beginning of this year, at least 300 rockets have been fired.

While the media has constantly asserted that the source of Palestinian anger is this, that, or some other Israeli action, it never asserts the reverse. When Palestinians were blowing themselves up on a daily basis, the media did its best to understand the phenomenon. Their conclusion? What did Israel expect when Israel was occupying Palestinian lands? What did you expect, when Israel had so "humiliated" the Palestinians?

Well, since then Israel ended the occupation and an entire Israeli population has had their homes turned into a battlefied. Where are the apologists now? Why is no one prognosticating dire warnings about what this may lead the residents of Sderot to do? Will anyone defend the residents of Sderot if they take the matter into their own hands? Or do they deserve what is happening to them and thus do not even deserve our compassion and comprehension?

The fact that almost no Western reporter has bothered to do what Mr. Jacobson did - spend three days in the line of fire - sadly leads me to the conclusion that this is, in fact, what most reporters think.

Where Up is Down

Clearly irony is something that is completely lost on the Syrians. The same group of thugs who have most recently systematically killed 10 politicians and journalists in Lebanon are lecturing the world about terrorism and peace. According to Walid al-Moualem, a Syrian government spokesman:

"Whoever wants peace does not commit terrorism..."

If only some of our politicians could be convinced to think this way!

Of course, then he goes on to say:

"The fighter Imad Moughniyah was the target of lots of intelligence agencies. He was a backbone of the Islamic resistance."

Killing an active fighter in the "resistance" can hardly be called terrorism. After all, when a soldier is killed in battle, that is not an act of terror - that is part of their job description.

The attempt to label the act a "crime" is even more absurd:

"As a state, we will irrefutably prove the party involved in this crime and who stands behind it. An investigation is ongoing,"

The real crime is that an individual who was wanted for his crimes by no less than 42 countries was walking freely in Syria.

The notion that he was somehow "off limits" because he was not in Lebanon when he was killed is also really rich. Especially coming from a group that blew up an Embassy and a Jewish Community Center in Argentina and has threatened to repeat these crimes in the near future.

Bush is a Terrorist

According to Osama Bin Laden's son, his father is no more a terrorist than President Bush. As he points out, his father does not feel that he is killing innocent civilians. This is not because his father is a bloodthirsty madman, but rather stems from his reasoned position regarding the culpability of all Americans. After all, if they pay taxes to the American government they forfeit the right to consider themselves either innocent or civilians.

Worse, as Omar Bin-Laden notes, the American people voted for Bush twice, so what do they expect? That this ignores the minor fact that the team which carried out 9/11 attacks were already preparing in the summer of 2000 - prior to the US presidential elections - is completely inconsequential. Who can argue with retroactive guilt? (Actually I kind of want to agree with him on this one - "Down with the Tyranny of the Time-space Continuum!")

I also really liked the part where he compares Osama to Gerry Adams and the way the "hard-hitting" reporter nods in agreement with him about not only Adams, but about Bush being a terrorist. Check out the video).

You should compare this video with the one he gave a few weeks ago for CNN. In that one, he was interviewed with his well spoken and attractive British wife. They speak about their desire to promote peace by sponsoring a race across North Africa. There is nothing offensive in that video. Unless, of course you find it offensive that Osama Bin Laden's son seems to be living in the lap of luxury and not languishing in Guantanamo.

Islam + Fascism?

Two recent articles highlight the need to be clear about the nature of the threats facing the world from radical Muslim ideologists, or what Christopher Hitchens rightly terms Islamofascists. Rejecting criticism that this term is ahistorical (fusing ideologies from different eras) or unjustly singles out one religion, Hitchens defends the term:

The most obvious points of comparison would be these: Both movements are based on a cult of murderous violence that exalts death and destruction and despises the life of the mind. ("Death to the intellect! Long live death!" as Gen. Francisco Franco's sidekick Gonzalo Queipo de Llano so pithily phrased it.) Both are hostile to modernity (except when it comes to the pursuit of weapons), and both are bitterly nostalgic for past empires and lost glories. Both are obsessed with real and imagined "humiliations" and thirsty for revenge. Both are chronically infected with the toxin of anti-Jewish paranoia (interestingly, also, with its milder cousin, anti-Freemason paranoia). Both are inclined to leader worship and to the exclusive stress on the power of one great book. Both have a strong commitment to sexual repression—especially to the repression of any sexual "deviance"—and to its counterparts the subordination of the female and contempt for the feminine. Both despise art and literature as symptoms of degeneracy and decadence; both burn books and destroy museums and treasures.

Interestingly, he does not shy from noting that Islamofascism, while a right-wing and religious movement also regularly appropriates the language of the Left.

Fascism (and Nazism) also attempted to counterfeit the then-success of the socialist movement by issuing pseudo-socialist and populist appeals. It has been very interesting to observe lately the way in which al-Qaida has been striving to counterfeit and recycle the propaganda of the anti-globalist and green movements.

No doubt this - combined with a desire to see the collapse of the US and the Western capitalism that it represents - explains in part why many in the Left have secretly rooted for a group whose game plan and values they would normally excoriate. Sadly, these generally well-meaning and liberal leaning people, do not realize to what extent their support and inability to confront this threat endangers all that they hold dear. Worse, it sacrifices to totalitarianism precisely those who the liberals think they are helping.

As Bernard Lewis recently noted, Islamofascism is first and foremost a threat to Muslims in the same way that both Bolshevism and Fascism were a threat to their societies. Unfortunately, it did not take long before these ideological "deformations" threatened the rest of the world as well. (See article in The Sun)

Hitchens echoes this and points out that both radical Islam and Fascism:

...evidently suffer from a death wish. It is surely not an accident that both of them stress suicidal tactics and sacrificial ends, just as both of them would obviously rather see the destruction of their own societies than any compromise with infidels or any dilution of the joys of absolute doctrinal orthodoxy.

Characteristically, Lewis is even more blunt:

"It's misleading to say we are engaged in a war against terrorism," Mr. Lewis said. "If Churchill had told us that we were engaged in a war against submarines and war craft, we'd be in a different world today. Terrorism is a tactic, it is not the enemy."